her real world

On being dumped: Trying to reconnect

I’m trying to scan more photos as I’m trying to piece together my life between 1999 and 2006. I did a few scans when I first bought my scanner (the photo above included) but have yet to do anymore. The time between 2006 and today has also been rough.

I don’t for a second want to go back to when I was in this photo. Even though then, both of my grandmothers were still alive and I still got to spend every day with my family. My Dad was sick. I longed for adventure.

I didn’t have a Bachelors degree in Political Science, I certainly didn’t have a Masters degree in Canadian Studies. I hadn’t been a Senate Page. I hadn’t been a Parliamentary Intern in both the House of Commons in Ottawa and in London. I hadn’t spent 4 years gaining invaluable work and life experience as a public servant in Ottawa (August 24 is my 4 year anniversary of walking into the building where i currently work).

In this photo, I’d never been kissed, never had a boyfriend. I didn’t have two glorious cats who are the best roommates on earth. I had never met Him. I hadn’t met some of the greatest people in my life (I’d name you but honestly if I forgot one of you I’d not be able to forgive myself. If you wish you were one of the people I’d name, you are one of them). I’d not been to my little sister’s beautiful wedding.  I’d not be sitting right here right now writing this blog post.

I had never been dumped.

Being dumped was a terrible experience. Being dumped meant that all of the effort that I had put into the relationship and sacrifices I had made for that relationship didn’t matter. It meant that six years of compromises and shaving off bits of myself so that we could fit better together and so that our relationship could work didn’t matter. I was left sobbing in the middle of the apartment, not eating and just waiting after every time I heard the elevator doors open (my apartment is right beside them) that there would be a knock on the door and the words that would make the nightmare stop.

I felt as though I had done a terrible thing. I had sacrificed so many things for a relationship that was over with a note duct taped to my wall. I had sacrificed time with my family every time I went home to Manitoba so that I could spend time on the phone with him. I had sacrificed friendships to develop a relationship with someone I wholly believed was my best friend and who I believed I would be with forever. Which is how I justified the sacrifices. Because they were worth it.

I’ve learned something. I’ve learned not to sacrifice bits of myself that are important, because you never know when you’re going to have to go back and make six years worth of apologies for lost time. I feel so much guilt, sometimes it’s so overwhelming that I just try and ignore it. Other times I realize that though I didn’t really burn bridges that I’d be more comfortable about asking for help if the bridges were in better repair. So this post is dedicated to repairing bridges.

I have no idea who reads my blog. I barely know how to access my site statistics, I have no idea who subscribes to the feed. I know that I import the posts as notes into my Facebook account. I know that I get lovely comments on occasion from lovely people.

But if you read this and you’d like me to repair our bridge, please let me know. I’m right now trying to do the best I can but I’m spreading myself thin and getting overwhelmed. I don’t know what bridges were out there and who cares to reconnect. So if you read this and you want me to make you cookies or go to coffee or let you yell at me while I sit quietly, let me know.

For those of you who don’t want to let me know, I’m in the process of importing all of the blog entries I’ve ever written into this blog. For the longest time I have struggled with what I wanted to share and what I’ve shared. I figure at the very least that you all deserve to root through the contents of my last six years and see if there is anything good.

I’ve hung the big old “Under Construction” sign on my network of bridges people. Through the power of the Internet I hope we can get in touch.

http://herrealworld.com/

http://flickr.com/photos/herrealworld/

http://twitter.com/herrealworld/

http://facebook.com/herrealworld/

http://youtube.com/herrealworld/

http://delicious.com/herrealworld/

http://www.allconsuming.net/person/herrealworld/

http://blip.fm/herrealworld

Handmade pasta with baby summer squash

Sadly this is one of my weekends not in Toronto and not having him here in Ottawa. Honestly this is an okay thing for the operational part of my life as if I’m on the road too long or have company, I don’t do the little things like all the laundry or grocery shopping. I was speaking to a colleague today who is in a similar situation and he too feels the distance between Ottawa and Toronto spreads him a little thin and requires that he eat a lot of takeout.

My process post on this dish will follow (it’s just a fresh pasta recipe and pan fried baby summer squash) as it was my first time making pasta, but I couldn’t wait to share with you the result of a huge farmers market score and a night of hard work. The photo was rushed, I couldn’t bother getting my tripod out as my dinner was getting colder by the second. But this is quite possibly one of the most amazing things I have ever made myself. And sadly I didn’t share it with anyone as my default dinner date is in Toronto and I didn’t plan far enough ahead to invite someone over.

Which is kind of okay too, only because the two very generous servings I made will go to good use. The pasta recipe made enough pasta for four servings and I only cooked two this evening. I plan on seeing if I can find a farmers market tomorrow to find something to go with the rest of the pasta. One portion I ate, and god was it delicious. And the second portion is sitting in a lovely container in the fridge waiting to be devoured Monday for lunch.

Today I splurged and got a whole darn bunch of sushi that I couldn’t finish. It was a bit of an adieu to a way of life that I’ve become really accustomed to while working. I get lazy, I don’t make lunch. I spend 10-15 dollars a day on really sub-par food (the only easy option at work is a cafeteria that serves what I lovingly call “slop”), money that I could be spending on lovely fresh groceries and little treats like a block of Parmesan cheese. Which is totally what I did for tonight’s supper.

So here is to hoping that I don’t snarf down all the food I make this weekend for lunches next week.

On being flexitarian: The Farmers Market

Or alternatively titled: How shopping at farmers markets brings back fond childhood memories.

I’m sorry that this photo is so blurry. I promise that I’ll upload some photos taken with a camera other than my iPhone soon. But really, I had to take a picture of these berries before I snarfed them down.

One of the things I like most about being flexitarian is the fact that I’ve cut back on my meat consumption (I’ve been trying to eat only local or sustainable or organic meats) and that I’m eating a lot more fresh produce. Also, I’m eating less of everything, which means I can afford to splurge and buy the most delicious raspberries on earth.

And oh they were delicious.

In figuring out who I am, I’ve been spending a lot of time figuring out what my favourite things are. Fresh raspberries are one of them. Eating them on their own reminds me of the excruciating hours spent picking raspberries with my family. The only thing that makes them better is cold cream and a bit of sugar.

Farmers markets are lovely and dangerous things, I have to go in with a strict budget. Today I visited the farmers market just down the street from where I work. I went in with $15 and came out with a huge bouquet of sunflowers, a half-pint of raspberries and two pints of baby summer squash. The flowers adorn my desk, as mentioned, the raspberries are happy in my belly, and the baby summer squash will be a lovely homemade pasta dinner tonight and lunch tomorrow.

Farmers markets are an excellent place to find seasonal, delicious food. Yes, the food can sometimes be more expensive. Sometimes it can be a lot cheaper. But if you’re careful and you find good quality local produce, you’ll wonder how you ever ate hard white hothouse tomatoes from the supermarket again.

Being a bit of a farmgirl snob, I sometimes wonder how anyone could ever think that what comes out of the supermarket is a REAL tomato, as growing up I can remember laying hundreds of tomatoes out on newspaper to ripen so that we could can them for the winter. In summer, lunch and supper often consisted of toasted tomato sandwiches, sometimes with bacon or cheese, mostly just with salt and pepper and margarine and maybe a bit of mayonnaise. In winter, we had the most delicious canned tomatoes ever.

One of the things I like most about being a flexitarian is that I’m going back to how I ate while growing up. I place standards on what is good enough to eat, which often times means I eat less. This comes to me at a much higher cost as when I was on the farm, the tomato plants were bought but the tomatoes we ate only cost the hard work it took to nurture and harvest them. Homemade pasta will be a lot of work tonight and not everyone can afford to buy $8 of baby summer squash.

But the end product is going to be a small portion of deliciousness that makes my heart and my waistline sing.